


The Last

by mommyisageek



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-12
Updated: 2014-01-12
Packaged: 2018-01-08 12:37:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1132730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mommyisageek/pseuds/mommyisageek
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He knows he’s dying.  He’ll accept it.  But there’s just something he has to do first.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last

He knows. He knows the moment it starts, he always does; feels it somewhere deep in his chest. Another Time Lord, for the life of him he can’t remember who, once told him that one can actually feel the hearts beginning to fail and that is, generally, what triggers the energy.

He can feel it. He knows. But he refuses.

He’s not done yet. There’s so much left he needs to do before he can go. Davros was right. The Master was right. The Master had it all figured out. For good or bad, there were too many, too, too many on his hands, his chest, his conscience. There was too much he had to make right before he could go and no way to do so.

But maybe, at least, he could see them. See that they, those he loved so much and so dearly, were bettered and okay. Maybe, just maybe, that could make up for the amount of red in his ledger.

He was going to have to try very hard just not to think about that.

One by one, each in their time, he sees them again. Martha, Mickey, Sarah Jane (dear Sarah Jane) and Luke, Wilfred, wonderful Donna, dear Joan’s great-granddaughter, Jack, Alonzo (oh, what a man he was), all well as can be expected. Some of them don’t see him and, to be honest, that’s okay and absolutely how it should be. He can only hope he left, and leaves, them better than he found them. It’s the least he can do for everything each of them did, over and over, for him.

With each one, he’s one step closer, but there are so many he can’t see again.

Davros was right. So many sacrificed. If only he could find them all, save them all. If only he could see them, if only just once. Those wonderful, obedient Ood, so trusting and left behind, the ones he should have freed. Amazing, strong, beautiful, wonderful Astrid with her starry eyed dreams, the one he should have protected. The ones that never were. The ones that never followed, though he wished they could. But, they were beyond him, beyond what even he was capable of.

And all the while it’s there, in the back of his mind, just below his thoughts, that little voice telling him to just “jump jump jump”, urging him to fall, fall, fall. To give it all; see the one person he truly wants to see, the one he left so broken; the one he destroyed without meaning to, but not so completely she is gone forever.

Just where it is impossible for him to go.

Because he can’t go, not there. It’s not safe. He’s burned up one sun already. He’s torn universes apart. He can’t do it again. He’s not strong enough, for one. And, for another, it’s not him. He saves the world, not destroys it. He keeps it functioning, doesn’t tear it apart.

But oh does he want to. Every step, every breath, every moment, all he wants, all he wants is to drink her in. One last time. One last time before…

It’s the first time he’s actually let himself be jealous of that other one, that incarnation, that meta-crisis, well, him that he left on Bad Wolf Bay, holding her hand.

He knows how this works; he’s been through it enough to know and understand. Once this is over, while he will have the memories and experiences and yes, technically he is the same person, he’s…well, he’s not. Not really. Whoever he becomes, whoever this body creates to keep every cell in his body from giving up and ceasing to exist, will not know the amazing woman that was, and is, his Rose. He will not be in love with that amazing creature and, in the future, if she ever manages that jump again (even though he told her not to, he knows her (knows her well) and, to be honest, she was never very good with the following-directions thing), she will not know or recognize this new man.

She will lose him, again, just like he is about to lose her, completely.

Again.

He has to remind himself, over and over, that it would destroy the universe. That world is sealed off. Both worlds are safe. Breaking that rift, still so fragile, again would destroy reality itself.

He can’t do that. Not to satisfy his own selfish whims.

No matter how much he might want to.

He can’t cross his own timeline because of the idiotic paradoxes. There isn’t a place in time he can visit where she will know who he is.

Where she will know who he is…

But does she need to? Would just seeing her be enough for him? While yes, of course, he wants to be able to tell her everything. He wants to hold her and say those words she needs to hear, the ones he never would say to her because he didn’t entirely want to admit it to himself, but he can’t do that.

But he can see her.

She didn’t always travel with him. She existed outside of and beyond him for many years before he came along and stole her away, never to return her.

He had never intended to return her. But he also never intended to be separated from her either. She had promised to stay with him, forever, and had never once doubted and turned back on it.

If only he could remember exactly…

It takes him seven tries to get it right, partially because he’s having to expend so much energy to fight and partially because he couldn’t remember exactly what year to aim for. But finally, finally, he lands on the right street, in the snow, and hears a voice he knows.

Rose.

Younger. Laughing. Smiling.

He misses that smile and when it used to be for him.

She was the first thing he – well, this he – saw, nervous and scared and curious and so warm and soft and human. Burned into his conscience as his anchor, his center, his hold on reality. He needs her. He’s always needed her.

He needs her to be the last thing he sees.

He watches her down the street for a moment, walking with Jackie. By their conversation, it must be New Years.

In not too many months, she is going to be in the right place at the perfect time and he’s going to get to grab her hand and tell her to “Run”. And his life would never be the same again.

Neither will hers.

He won’t speak to her. He just wants to see her. Needs to see her before he loses her forevermore.

He groans, because the pain is so bad he almost can’t stand it. But he will. He has to. He has to look at her just a few moments longer before she goes inside. He’s about to lose this fight.

“You okay, mate?” She heard him and turned to him and she’s speaking – to him – again and part of him is lost again.

“Yeah,” he tries to laugh but he’s fighting back tears. He turns a bit, keeps to the shadows – a random stranger on a random night. Nothing unusual, nothing to remember.

“Too much to drink?” She does laugh.

“Something like that.” He cringes again, closing his eyes to the pain.

“Maybe it’s time you went home.”

“Yeah.”

“Anyway…Happy New Year.” She smiles at him and turns to go inside and he knows he should let her go, he knows he should let her walk away, but he just can’t. He just can’t yet. He doesn’t want her to go.

“And you,” he says, before she can leave. His brain isn’t working but he needs to keep her here. Needs to keep her talking. “What year is this?” he blurts out. Anything, anything.

“Blimey, how much have you had?” He shrugs half-heartedly. “2005. January the first.”

He nods. “2005. Tell you what,” he needs to say good-bye but he can’t. So he just smiles through the pain, blinks back tears, and drinks her in one last time. “I bet you’re going to have a really great year.”

She watches him cautiously then smiles, that smile that melts him completely, and just nods, laughing. “Yeah? Well, see you.”

This time, well, this time when she turns he lets her go. He can’t hold it together much longer. His vision is blurry, the world is spinning, and he can feel it. He can feel the movement under his feet. He stares down the alley to that wonderful blue box and isn’t even sure he can make it, but he knows he must, so he puts one foot in front of the other and tries to force himself forward.

Because, though she didn’t know who he was, had she, she wouldn’t want him to give up. She would have preferred a different look to seeing him in such pain. She was always amazing like that.

His Rose. His beautiful, wonderful, amazing Rose.

The first thing he ever saw and the very last memory he would hold onto.


End file.
